


Snowfall

by Ophiel



Series: Lyrium and Faith [1]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-29
Updated: 2015-09-29
Packaged: 2018-04-23 23:09:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4895839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ophiel/pseuds/Ophiel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being the Herald of Andraste calls upon a young and pampered mage to become more than she is. But that hasn't quite sunk in yet. She has reclaimed the Hinterlands, but it is not the Hinterlands that makes a Herald. An impromptu sparring session with the Inquisitions Military Commander begins to open her eyes to all she has yet to become.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Snowfall

It was not the incessant rains of the Storm Coast that clung to the skin in the cold. It not the snows of the Frostbacks that stiffened the toes and joints of all who trod through the biting cold. These could be endured with grit. To complain would be weakness when the soldiers of the Inquisition had to face worse for longer periods of time.

It was not even the Chantry politics of Val Royeaux that was akin to walking through a pen of malignant angry cats. All these things Evelyn Trevelyan could handle. Orlesian politics was not unlike home in the Free Marches, where silence could wound as much as a shiv in the dark. Even the Ostwick Circle had its fair share of friction between the fraternities.

That was what she could not stand - the mark. The mark that some said marked her as blessed by the Maker. They called her the Herald of Andraste, through no choice of hers. It was merely by circumstance that she had literally fallen into the middle of events that threatened to shake Thedas, she did not feel herself unusual or special because of it. Mostly, she felt lost, though she'd be damned if she showed it to anyone but the Maker. There were some trappings of a noble background that were hard to shake off, even in the Circle.

Not that there were Circles anymore. As the mage rebellion escalated into all-out war with the Templars and with everyone else, Divine Justinia called for both Templars and mages to sit down to peace talks. The Conclave would be held in the most sacred place in all of Thedas, the Temple of Sacred Ashes, where under the eyes of the Maker in the final known resting place of his Divine Prophet Andraste, they could end the chaos.

She had been sent there to observe the talks. She was a promising apprentice to the First Enchanter - his youngest, in fact. She was also a mage from the Trevelyan family, a family so powerful even Templars stepped carefully around them. She remembered the journey from Ostwick, she remembered setting up in the mage quarters, she remembered waking up the day of the explosion and then… nothing.

Nothing until the pain in her left hand had roused her from a three-day long coma with spitting green fire and searing pain.

She looked down at the mark on her right palm as she stood at the top of the walls of Haven. From the lookout platform against the inside of the wall, the valley of Haven spread before her, mountains clawing into the dark gray sky lit with eerie green from the Breach that loomed over them - a green that also glowed freely from the mark if she didn't think about it. She rubbed her palm through the leather glove. The green glow still shone, as if the leather wasn't there. Focus enough and the mark was tame. She shut her eyes, willing it to quieten. It did, the glow dimming and the burning fading into a dull fire in her nerves. The training that allowed her to hurl lightning from her hands also helped her control the mark to some degree. That was reassuring.

She sighed, wondering if it were luck or divine purpose that placed the mark on the hand of a mage, when magic ripped open the sky and killed the Divine. She straightened and leaned on her hands, the night breeze that carried hints of snow to come tugged at her long dark hair and leather coat. She sighed contentedly, her breath misting in the chill before being torn away in the breeze. It was quiet now in Haven. She liked the peace.

Movement caught her eye. In the soldiers' tents outside the walls, a figure moved. She smiled, recognising the pauldrons of luxurious fur. Cullen. She watched him head to the stocks with blade and shield in hand, a dark shadow against the Breach-lit snow. On a whim, she climbed down from the lookout platform and headed to the gate.

The guards at Haven's gate recognised her. They saluted and opened the gate. She gave them a winsome smile of thanks and headed out. Her boots crunched in the snow as she walked across to the tents as the gates shut behind her. Cullen did not seem to notice her as she approached, with his back to her as he practiced with the stocks. His sword strokes rang out in the night. There was no complaint from the tents nearby, perhaps the soldiers were used to this late-night training. "Commander," she greeted, her voice low and smooth in that effortless way she had. "Trouble sleeping?"

He chuckled slightly, turning to look at her with a slight smile. "No, this is the only time I have to practice on my own. What of you, Herald? It's a bit late to be walking about in the snow."

"I'll never get used to that title," she rolled her eyes as she walked to an unused stock, leaning against the wooden dummy out of range of his sword strikes. The last thing she wanted was to be stabbed accidentally. Talking to Cullen was always fascinating. She had never spoken to Templars so freely. Well, hardly ever. Templars were usually innocent, celibate, and faithful. Fraternizing between them and mages was often frowned upon. And now, here was Cullen allowing her an unusual insight into the way Templars really were.

"Shouldn't you be resting for your journey to Therinfall Redoubt tomorrow?" he asked amidst the strikes.

"I couldn't sleep," she admitted, watching him. There was a calm certainty about the way he moved, so self-assured with blade and shield, wearing armour as if it weighed nothing. Her uncles and cousins moved like that after years of training. But not even they could match the Templars, the best trained warriors in Thedas. "I hope the Templars will be amenable to talks tomorrow. With a Magister on our doorstep and the Breach in the sky…"

"I must admit, I am surprised you agreed to talk to the Templars instead of allying with the rebel mages."

"Why?"

His movements slowed as he glanced at her awkwardly. "Well-"

"Because I'm a mage?" she smiled in warm amusement. "Clearly, we wouldn't trust those nasty Templars skulking about, watching us all the time."

"I didn't mean any offence," he muttered, lowering sword and shield.

"None taken," she chuckled. "Don't worry, Cullen. I liked the Templars, after a while. Once you earn their trust, it's easy to get along with them. By 'get along', I mean not have them follow you everywhere and eyeing you like you stole the silverware or were a breath away from Blood Magic. They're just doing, well, their duty, for the most part."

"It's good to see that there are some mages who recognize this. The Templars take no pleasure in acting as bogeymen out to harm their charges, even if they do steal the silverware."

She chuckled. "I can't imagine you as a bogeyman, you're too nice, Cullen."

He couldn't help but laugh at that, his eyes lingering on her smile. He cleared his throat and turned back to his strikes, shield raised. "I'm not nice all the time," he said. "And in the past, especially not to mages."

"Everyone goes through their own journey," Evelyn smiled as he moved through the same practiced sword strike. "I didn't trust Templars either at first, until I came to know them better. Some were good, some not so, but the same could be said for everyone."

"That's a forgiving view for an ex-Templar to hear," he said seriously, his sword flashing as he struck the stock. "Especially for one who acted with distrust towards mages himself, sometimes without cause."

"I'm an Aequetarian," she shrugged. "It's what we do. Middle of the road, forgiving, idealistic to the point of foolishness." Around them the snow began to fall, a steady veil of white tinged with the light of the Breach enclosed them. Snow settled in her dark hair and in the fur of his pauldrons.

"You're not foolish."

"See what I mean about you being too nice?" There was mischief in her eyes as she saw the colour rising in his cheeks. She enjoyed finding new ways to make him blush, there was something appealing about the fact that it was sometimes so easy. Perhaps it was a perverse pleasure, she honestly did not know, but she couldn't deny that he made her smile and forget the mark's constant dull fire.

"It occurs to me that I have not had any professional advice on facing Templars, Cullen," she said, straightening up and adjusting the hem of her glove. "In case things go tits-up, and since you're itching for a workout, might I ask that you give me some instruction?"

"Is the Herald of Andraste allowed to say 'tits-up'?" he grinned. "It makes you sound like a fishwife."

"You heard me," she said. "I should have asked you earlier but now that I think about it, I've never fought a proper Templar. That sort of experimentation is discouraged in the Circle."

"Proper? Weren't they harrying the Hinterlands? I recall Cassandra telling me you took down quite a few."

"I mean a good one. I had never raised my staff against another person in combat before I got the mark, and the fact that they went down to my inexperienced fighting technique speaks volumes about their calibre. But you - you're a good Templar," she paused, frowning at how her words came out. She sounded like a doe-eyed apprentice. "You know what I mean."

He straightened up and turned to her, his honeyed eyes narrowed with thought. He looked even more appealing when he was serious than when she made him blush. She wondered if there were ever a time when the Commander did not, in fact, command every eye in the room. She wondered if he even noticed that he did. He probably didn't, he struck her as the selectively oblivious sort. Then she realized that she ought to stop fixating on his damn eyes, even if they were pretty. "You want pointers?" he asked.

"I want practice. Weak spots in their armour, how they deflect my spells, their range and blind areas. Are their techniques similar to shield bearers? I have to know." She shook her staff free from its clasp on her back, the wood and metal thrumming to life with lightning at the pinnacle. "The First Enchanter told me of Templar techniques and abilities, but the Templars I faced in the Hinterlands were dregs - poor examples. They won't be the ones I may face tomorrow."

"I don't want to hurt you, Herald." Though he said that, she could see the twitch in his sword arm and the slight smile peeking at the corner of his lips.

"I don't think either of us will be fighting to the fullest. Though, let's face it, you could take me down easily. For now." Evelyn smirked, readying her stance - feet wide on the soft snow, arms apart and staff held low. "You're the Inquisition's military adviser. Advise me."

The snow seemed to whisper as it fell around them, wrapping them in their own cocoon of privacy, hidden from view with their voices hushed. Cullen raised his shield before him, his sword pointed towards her. He lowered his body to maximise the coverage of his shield. She had seen these poses among the Templars in the Hinterlands, but not a one of them mastered the form as she saw before her now. She looked for gaps from the front, but there were none.

"The first thing you want," he said then, "is distance." He charged, inexorably closing the gap between them in two strides. Evelyn seemed to flicker into the falling snow and vanished backwards. He paused to listen - distant running footsteps moving in an arc around him, then a burst of lightning from afar to the left, flanking him. He turned his shield and blocked the lightning, angling the shield down so the bolts seared into the snow on the ground before him. Through the rising steam of boiling snow, he moved towards the bolts that kept surging towards him. Mages could not move when casting due to the absolute focus involved in forming their spells. He saw a shadow in the curtain of snow as it raised its staff.

Lightning seared down from the sky, striking him, but the bolts merely flickered over his skin and faded into a blue glow as he grimaced. He was close enough to see her face now, her expression shocked. The Templars in the Hinterlands had gone down to spells less powerful than this, but Cullen shrugged it off like snowfall. "Templars can bolster their immunity to primal magic," he said, speaking with the voice of a trainer. She frowned and flickered away into the snow once more to put distance between them, but his shield seemed to follow her, blocking her path. It clanged against something as she swept past him like the cold wind.

She halted twenty feet away from him, her staff arm quivering from his shield's strike to her staff. She looked down and tried to shake the nerves back to life, only to glance up to see him charging to her once more. "Focus! Staff up!" he snapped. Evelyn grit her teeth and felt the clang of metal against metal as she raised her staff to block his sword strike. The blade caught in the wrapping of the staff grip. "If that were any quicker, you'd be dead," he chided her face to face.

She glared at him, her eyes hardening with determination. She twisted her staff, using her movement to imbalance him and strike away the sword as she turned to dodge under his arm. From behind, she saw her opening. Her staff in her left hand, her right flared with electrical energy. She pressed the spell right into him until he twisted, flowing with her own motion to catch the bolt on his pauldron.

The burst of energy sent her flying backwards, landing in the snow with her feet wide and her body low, catching her balance at the last minute. She saw him stagger from the blast, current arcing over the pauldron's metal. There was no blue glow. She raised her staff to cast again. There was a blinding flash of light in her eyes, a light that fell like a white shroud that made her ears ring and her eyes burn. She grimaced and shielded her eyes with her arms.

When the searing white light cleared, she blinked as the world swam into focus once more. She felt warmth on her arms, warm breath. There he was, in front of her, standing there with his sword not even raised. He was close enough that she could smell him, the leather, the sweat, the oil from his armour. She felt her heart skip a beat as she looked up at him, frozen, her arms still raised. She felt the heat rise from her fluttering stomach to her chest to her cheeks; and saw that slight smugness in his eyes.

"Their backs," she said to him as she stepped back quickly. She remembered to breathe and began to pant from the sudden bursts of energy she had expended in their skirmish. She felt weak and bested in more ways than one. She really needed to become better accustomed to combat. In the Circle, mages wielded quills rather than staves during confrontations. But he was a veteran Templar, while she was a much-younger, inexperienced, and, if she were brutally honest, over-pampered noble mage.

He was also not as oblivious as he looked or acted. "Their backs are their weak spots," she said, willing her voice to be serious, to shake the girlish quiver from her words. "Get close enough before their defenses rise."

"Well-spotted," he said, his voice washing over her, business-like but for the smug gleam in his eyes. "But getting close to them and surviving, that's another matter. Your best option is to rely on distractions. A Templar facing an opponent up close will have little time to raise defences against magic."

"Thank goodness I do not work alone," she said. "You blocked lighting. Can you do the same for ice? Fire?"

He smiled faintly. "All primal spells," he said. "Lyrium gives us a multitude of abilities to counter and even dispel magic. As for the rest, our faith sees us through."

"And that's all you need? Lyrium and faith?"

"Most of the time, it's enough."

"But how much resistance does it give you?"

"Complete."

"That's not what I saw." She saw him hesitate. "But I guess… it's late at night. My eyes might have been playing tricks on me." She swung her staff to its clasp on the back of her coat. "Thank you, Cullen," she said, her voice thoughtful as she watched him. "I've learned a lot from you."

"Happy to help, Herald."

"Evelyn, please."

"Evelyn." She liked the way her name sounded on his voice. He turned to head back to the soldiers' tents.

He had gone a few steps when her voice cut through the quiet of the snowfall once more. "How often do you let mages get that close?" she asked him. She saw him pause and look over his shoulder, his pauldrons almost blocking his face from view.

"Never," he said almost too quickly, as if the answer came unbidden. He hesitated and finally sighed. "Or rather, hardly ever. Goodnight, Herald."

That left her angry. She had not expected his closeness to unwind her like that. And all he did was stand there! For all that she had casually flirted with him - and he was too good-looking not to - she was not accustomed to losing control. It was irrational and she did not like it. "Goodnight, Commander." He walked off into the snow and she too turned to head back to Haven's gates. She waited a moment until she was sure he was out of earshot, then swore in a most unfeminine fashion. "Hardly ever, indeed!" she snapped, annoyance in her voice. She felt like she fought flailing about like a jester flinging fireballs for a lark. And that smirk he had… he had certainly wiped the smirk off her. She did not realize that her voice carried to the tents so she did not see his smile. She frowned as she headed back to her quarters, barely aware of the dull throbbing of her mark. Realizing one's own inadequacies was difficult, at the same time, the Commanded smelled rather nice. 


End file.
